I grew up in a household where my accountant father and property manager mother used to invest in different asset classes - primarily shares and residential property. Mum and dad actually had much better success with shares than with property - looking back, they typically bought poorly, and sold when the market was just starting to rise (and therefore missing out on major capital gains).
However I did learn about negative and positive gearing at an early age (first discussion on this when I was about 12), and my dad was always happy to discuss investing principles, as well as legal ways to minimise tax.
Fast forward to when I was 21, and I was living with my boyfriend of the time. We tended to live very much on a week to week basis, but I still managed to put aside $2K for a home deposit through Keystart Homes. When the BF and I split up, we kept it in both names for about a year and half, then I bought him out.
I did eventually sell that property, and ended up with $22K cash in hand. I put this into shares as a medium term arrangement, and it stayed there until my (now) husband and I bought our first property together, which is our PPOR. That was December 2005 - since then we've bought nine properties and sold two of them (and we sold them ourselves, no RE agent, which I've always been proud of
).
I think that I have always felt that for a really secure life, you need something other than just your income. My folks planned for their retirement really well, and I remember both mum and dad saying that the worst scenario is retiring on the pension, because that's not living, but existing. It obviously made an impression, anyhow.
Edit: Wow, sorry for the novel!